I couldn’t tear my eyes away. The guys that I’d grown up with—the ones who had been my best friends for most of my life, had just murdered someone in cold blood.
Chapter Nine
I ran. This time, I didn’t care who saw me, or where I was going.
I needed to get away from them, or I was certain they’d kill me, too. This whole time I thought this was a game to them. I thought their cruelty would meet some unspoken finish line, and if I could just hold out long enough, I’d win. But there was no winning at death.
I tripped on a stray branch, and a grunt escaped my lips as I crawled back up to a standing position and started running again. I was headed towards the wooded area behind the Kelly estate. If I could get there, maybe I could lose them.
“Fuck!” I heard Rogue exclaim. “Stay here and take care of the body. Make sure no drunk idiots stumble over here.”
Pounding boots dug into the earth behind me, and I knew I was being chased. Pushing my legs harder, I ran past the exhaustion, using my fear to propel me further. Holy shit, they just killed someone.
I didn’t look back, just kept running, dodging hanging limbs and fallen branches until my feet were scraped and bloodied. I was just about to make it to a wind in the trail that led to the public park at the back of their property, but before I could touch the tip of my toes to pavement, I was eating dirt. One of the assholes tackled me to the ground. The gritty mud coated my tongue as I used my fingers to try and claw my way out from under him. I didn’t get very far, because there was a rock-hard body on my back.
“Don’t say a fucking word,” Rogue growled against me.
Of course Rogue would be the one to catch me.
Rogue flipped me over then grabbed my wrists before shoving them up to hold them over my head. Sharp rocks dug into my shoulder blades as I squirmed, desperate to break free.
When it was clear that he wasn’t going to let me go, I stopped struggling and looked up at him. “I won’t say anything. I didn’t see anything,” I insisted.
I knew how this sort of thing went. I’d seen enough crime television to predict what would happen. I was dead. I knew too much to stay alive.
“Stop talking!” Rogue hissed.
He continued to hold me down, digging his pelvis into mine as he pinned me. I chanced a glance at his furious face, and gasped when I saw the look on his face. I should have been in shock, right? I should have been a sobbing mess on the floor, but I wasn’t. Instead of fear, I felt something else entirely.
My angry Heir. He looked like an vengeful angel. Or maybe a demon was more fitting. What the hell had happened to him to make him this way? And why the hell wasn’t I more bothered by it? I should be terrified, but I wasn’t. Not really. There was a larger part of me that unfolded as he pinned me down. The part of me that craved him, darkness and all.
We stayed like that, his body poised over mine, and me unable to break free. Nothing but rapid breaths, unblinking eyes, and licking lips were between us. As I watched him watching me, I wondered why I felt no fear, despite what I’d just seen. And maybe I was fucked up, but I shifted my thighs open ever so slightly, just to test if he was, in fact, as turned on as I was. I felt his hardened length, and an electric jolt of desire shot straight through me. We were both twisted fucks.
When I moved again, Rogue groaned, the low timber vibrating against my chest. He pinned me down even harder, his hands on me, forcing me still.
“You better keep quiet about what you saw, Scar,” he ordered, his voice unyielding. “I’ll kill you just like I killed him, you hear me? I won’t think twice about it.”
There was less venom in his voice than before, and despite this confusing interaction, his words were a harsh reminder of why I was running in the first place. I bucked beneath him, dying to break free, but loving the friction of my movements, too.
“You killed a man,” I whispered, mostly out of shock, like saying it outloud made it more